Taiwan Business Quick Take

Staff writer

BANKING

CHB investigates kickbacks

State-run Chang Hwa Commercial Bank (CHB, 彰化銀行) has completed the first phase of an investigation into a kickback scandal involving two executives at its Dongguang branch in China’s Guangdong Province, the National Treasury Administration said on Thursday. The bank has removed branch manager Chang Chiung-wen (張瓊文) and assistant manager Yu Chih-jen (游志仁) from their positions, the administration said, adding that CHB has turned the case over to prosecutors and started a second-phase investigation into whether other employees should be held accountable. Both Chang and Yu took a total of 50,000 yuan (US$7,956) in kickbacks from clients applying for credit, the bank said on Tuesday last week.

TECHNOLOGY

Bitmain sets up in Hsinchu

Beijing-based Bitmain Technologies Ltd (比特大陸), the world’s largest bitcoin miner, has set up an office in Hsinchu County, the Chinese-language Economic Daily News reported yesterday, citing unnamed sources from the local IC sector. Bitmain has attempted to recruit application-specific IC and artificial intelligence talents from tier-one IC design houses, such as MediaTek Inc (聯發科), MStar Semiconductor Inc (晨星半導體) and Global Unichip Corp (創意電子), by offering them high salaries, the report said.

ELECTRONICS

Ichia revenue grows

Handset keypad maker Ichia Technologies Inc (毅嘉科技) on Thursday posted revenue of NT$602.96 million (US$20.6 million) for last month, up 48.12 percent from NT$407.09 million a year earlier. Revenue increased slightly by 0.73 percent from the prior month’s NT$598.62 million, a filing with the Taiwan Stock Exchange showed. Last month’s revenue included about NT$468 million in sales of flexible printed circuit integrated components and about NT$142 million from mechanical integrated components, the company said. Recent price increases in raw materials have had little impact on the company’s operation, Ichia said.

STOCK EXCHANGE

JHL plans to delist

JHL Biotech Inc (喜康生技) on Thursday said it has received shareholders’ approval to terminate trading of its shares on the Taipei Exchange’s Emerging Stock Board. On Dec. 8 last year, JHL announced it was considering delisting from the smaller board, as the company plans to list on other stock exchanges in consideration of business expansion. The company on Thursday said that it would soon request permission from the Taipei Exchange to buy back its shares from investors at no less than NT$62.48 per share.

ELECTRONICS

Leatec plans price hike

Given persistent price hikes in upstream materials, Leatec Fine Ceramics Co Ltd (九豪精密陶瓷), which makes chip resistor substrates, has started negotiating prices with major clients, the Chinese-language Commercial Times reported on Thursday, citing industry sources. Leatec Fine Ceramics plans to increase its prices for all ceramic substrates by between 5 percent and 15 percent, the report said, adding that new prices could be applied on all new orders. The company said its substrate capacity would remain fully loaded in the first quarter and hopes its utilization rate remains high during the Lunar New Year holiday, as it is asking employees at its plants in Taoyuan’s Pingjhen District (平鎮) and in Kunshan in China’s Jiangsu Province to work overtime, the newspaper reported.

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